One of the hardest things about getting into a new hobby, sport, or practice is figuring out what tools you need to start. For many, especially myself, this is one of the most frustrating aspects of starting off. I want to move. I'd rather someone much, much smarter than myself to tell me what I need to kickstart the process.

That's a HUGE obstacle when it comes to trapping. I don't want to scare anyone...but you need a lot a lot of stuff. Luckily, nothing is overly expensive. But piecing together gear as a new trapper is tough. And like with many other practices, when you search online, you deal with a lot of conflicting opinions. More times than not, it feels like folks online are yelling at each other trying to convince everyone that what they use is the best and there is no other alternative - and if you use that other product, you're an idiot and you suck. So, what do you need to start trapping coyotes?

We want to save you the headache. We're not going to tell you that the...

Nope. We're not talking about knowing any particular material. We're not talking about knowing techniques. We're talking about CONFIDENCE (see our confident faces above).

To be a successful trapper you need confidence. And I prefer a lot of it. 

You need to have confidence in what you know, your plan, your execution, and your ability. Everything you do, every set you make, should have purpose. I don't set a single trap with low expectations. If you do, you're wasting time. Every trap I put in the ground, cover, and blend, I walk back to the truck telling myself, "oh, that's gonna catch a dog". 

If you're doubting the effectiveness of confidence, let's fix your thinking. When you're confident in what you know, even if you lack experience, your movements, decisions, and speed are all sharpened. You move with purpose. Even if you're making a mistake, or don't follow protocol to the "T", confident action will help to get you in and out of the set faster. 

If you get...

Everyone knows coyotes are killing their deer fawns. But how many? Well, while it's hard to make a statement that covers predation in the entire country, university studies in Georgia, South Carolina, and Alabama have shown a significant amount of deer hair in coyote scat during the fawning season. 

In studies conducted by the University of Georgia Deer Research Laboratory, during the late spring and early summer months, they would find fawn hair in 50-60% of coyote scat samples!!!

Coyotes are opportunistic eaters and will eat whatever is in abundance at the time. This means, the fawning season is the best time to lay some steel and trap some coyotes! 

For more direct information from Dr. Karl V. Miller and the UGA Deer Research Laboratory, check out these links so you can better understand how to manage your deer herd during the fawning season!

https://youtu.be/qOPMA34CXqA

https://youtu.be/pkGhkezuUlg

The dirt your auger frees up while drilling dirt holes is excellent dirt for sifting - don't let it go to waste!

At RPA we use a LOT of dirt hole sets. And in our time running these sets we think the auger pull is worth pointing out as a trapline tip. Of course, this tip may seem microscopic...but it is important! 

When drilling a dirt hole the most important things are depth, angle, and distance from your trap. But there are other things to keep in mind. Like how you remove your auger from the earth. 

If you just hit the gas on your drill and quickly pull it out, the lush dirt from your hole will be thrown everywhere. If you hit the gas and slowly pull out your auger, the lush dirt will fall into the bottom of your hole. We want that good dirt in our sifter. So what we'll do to make this happen is stop our drill completely and pull. 

Drill your hole to the appropriate depth, stop your drill, and pull. This pull may require a little bit of force BUT all of the prime...

When a substantial snow is in the forecast you need to be prepared to locate your already well-hidden sets!

Finding your sets can be difficult enough without snow. But when you get anything more than an inch or two, your sets will COMPLETELY DISAPPEAR. And when you get snow there is some update work your trapline will need so it's extremely important to mark your sets ahead of the snow. That way you can quickly find your sets and get to work. 

Before the snow comes, we like to use a natural object to mark and point towards our set. This marker is placed anywhere from 5-8 feet directly behind your set. 

In most locations you should be able to find a stick or small branch for this purpose. We like to find one that is about the size of our thumb. You don't want it to be too large because a big marker might deter predators from working your set. And you also don't want it to be too small that it'll break under the weight of the snow or strong winds. 

Once you have your...

Snow can add a little bit of extra work to your trapline but one HUGE advantage it gives you is the ability to scout with extreme precision. 

It doesn't matter when the snow comes. It could be pre-season, mid-season, or post-season - traps in the ground or not, you NEED to get out on the property you trap or plan to trap coyotes on. Predators can and will use nearly identical travel paths every single year. So when you've got a fresh snowfall, you've basically got a live heat map of where the predators on your property are coming from and going to. 

Snow makes identifying natural "pinch-points" incredibly easy so there is no better time to scout. If you're in season: you can take this new information and adjust your trapline and move your sets to hotter locations. If it's the off-season: You can make a plan for the next trapping season. 

No matter when it happens, if you want to increase your success as a coyote trapper, you NEED to get out and scout when there is...

There are a lot of pieces that go into deciding exactly where to place the sets on your trapline. Once you know what to look for, finding a good macro-location and choosing your micro-location is a breeze!

When creating Rex Predator Academy we decided to break down how we talk about "Location" into more specific terms. Generally when thinking about location, you should view it from the top down. Meaning first, you'll look at the big picture from a mile high view, and then you slowly zoom in while you account for terrain, wind directions, landscape opportunities, and more. 

We break this process down with two differentiating terms: Macro and Micro- Location. 

MACRO-Location is that mile high view we were talking about. You can identify good macro-locations on a map, with your phone, or visualizing your property from the top down. Macro-location puts you in the ballpark of where predators will tend to be. Typically, a good macro-location will be an intersection of 2 or more...

Being a successful trapper is a combination of numerous quick and detail oriented tasks.  Here's one of those detailed tips that'll make you look like a pro. 

Blend Where You Been. 

After you've made your set, bait and lured, and packed your tools the job is done, right? Wrong! There is one last task to complete: Brush out the impressions your knees and toes made in the dirt. 

This is an easy task to overlook. You just finished making a beauty of a dirt hole set and you remain there on your kneeling pad admiring your work. Everything is blended beautifully, nothing seems out of place, and it's ready to go. Then, you get up, lift your kneeling pad, and there they are: Two massive, smooth craters in the dirt. Leaving these craters as-is might not ruing your chances of catching a coyote but if you look at it, something is clearly off. And if something looks off or out of place to your human eyes, you can bet a shiny dollar a coyote will see something as being...

When making a game plan for where you want to put your sets, if it's possible, we try to make a game plan from a remote location. 

Macro-location and micro-location are two terms we use to more precisely talk about where we make our sets. As you'd suspect, "Macro" is location from a large perspective while "Micro" is a smaller perspective located within your macro-location. That being said, macro-location gets you in the ballpark of where you want to make a set. This is the general area that includes and surrounds pinch points, crossroads, and various intersections of long running features. For this trapline tip, we've already established a solid macro-location. 

I am a very visual and physical learner. I can adapt to situations and environments very well by physically moving around inside of the space. But this doesn't fare well when you're trying to reduce your footprint and scent left near your sets. The goal is to get in and out as fast as possible. This is delayed...

When starting a new trapline, the last thing you want to do is too much too soon. 

It can be hard at the beginning of the season or when you're getting your first sets in the ground to avoid throwing the kitchen sink at 'em. We've been there - you're down digging in the dirt, you've got three jars of new lures, a couple baits, some urine your buddy SWEARS by and you can't wait to put em all to the test. But having restraint here will go a long way to increase first night catches and prolonged success of your trapline. We tell our members, for a new line, LESS IS MORE. 

Here's our big tip to start a new line off right: Start with bait ONLY

We will typically run bait alone for the first 5-7 days of a trapline for a few reasons. 

1. Using bait alone is a subtle attractor. 
2. Bait alone will set off fewer red flags. 
3. It allows us to develop our trapline with our attractors over time. 

When you put everything in your bag at every set you've got, especially...